Secret Garden
by GreyGreyGrey
Summary: Ulquiorra, an arrogant CEO who maintains perfection. Orihime, a poor stuntwoman whose beauty and body are the object of envy amongst top actresses. An accidental meeting marks the beginning of a bickering relationship where Ulquiorra tries to hide a growing attraction to Orihime that both confuses and disturbs him. But when they inexplicably swap souls, dark secrets come to light.


**A/N: This story will be very OOC. Also, i don't own Bleach.**

 **Chapter One:**

As the sun stretched out his sunlight onto the homes in Karakura Town, one of his many rays landed upon the estate of our beloved main male character, Ulquiorra Schiffer. As he prepared himself for the day, shuffling around in his modernized yet compact home, the television set from the living room was on, and the weatherwoman, Mayoko Horigome, was delivering the daily forecast.

"Do you know of the Indian Summer? Before winter sets in, in the fall, it's a glimpse of summer. Indians, they say, hunted for the winter in that brief returning summer. That's why they called an Indian Summer, a gift from the gods. The Indian Summer for this fall is apparently going to be accompanied by much rain."

Walking down the white painted stairs connecting his bedroom to the living room, Ulquiorra placed his watch on his left wrist and fixed the cuffs of his black blazer.

"When this rain hits, could it be we'll receive some special gift from the gods?"

Stopping to reach down at white coffee table, he picked up the remote control and pointed it to the television set.

"But whether it's a gift or a joke from the gods, I suppose we'll have to see. Right, Mr. Ulquiorra Schiffer?" Mayoko winked.

Ulquiorra stopped, his emerald eyes widening a bit, lips slightly parted, and eyebrows raised.

Another man began to speak on the monitor. "Well then, Miss Horigome, thank you for that wonderful forecast, and now to Jou Uchiyama with the Sports."

Confused, he looked down to his hand holding the control, and then looked around the room.

No one was there.

Looking back at the screen, he pressed his lips into a line. Suddenly, a bright beam of light flashed all throughout the room, and a thunderous clap after it. Looking outside through his huge glass windows and doors, many lightning strikes flashed across the sky and their thunder following after it. Even more confused, he swallowed and blinked rapidly. The sky then turned a bit gray and sour.

Shrugging it off, he walked outside, and closed the glass door, a small click indicating that it locked by itself. He walked across the wooden patio, over the glorious pond that glistened with the remaining sunlight, and rippled as small dragonflies flew over it.

Climbing into a polished white two door car, he put the keys in the ignition, and revved the engine. Placing his right arm around the passenger's head rest, he looked to the back and he pulled out of his parking space. Ulquiorra drove onto the driveway of his estate, and peacefully drove down the road.

Though after just a few moments, he stopped infront of two people in an embrace standing in front of a smaller gray car. One of the individuals, presumably male, had distinctively bright blue hair, the other had long chestnut hair, a female. He paid no mind to the female and plainly stared at the blue-haired male, and at this Ulquiorra visibly frowned. It was his cousin Grimmjow and his newest girlfriend, Eriko Kimura. Ulquiorra's lip lifted upwards in disgust when he noticed them locking lips.

Looking at Grimmjow, he noticed that he had opened his eyes and looked right back at him, and merely waved, still kissing the woman in front of him.

Rolling his eyes, Ulquiorra, got a hold of the steering wheel and sped past them. The wind created from the rushing car picked up the skirt of Kimura and she quickly pulled out of Grimmjow's arms, screeching in an annoying high pitched tone as she tried to put her skirt down.

Grimmjow looked at Ulquiorra's speeding car, and wiped his bottom lip of the left over saliva of his kiss with Eriko.

"What was that just now?!" Eriko yelled, clearly flustered. "Who was that?!"

Still looking at the speeding car that was picking up dust everywhere, he replied, "ahh him? On the family registry, a cousin. In fact, a cousin or a son of a cousin." The car was no longer in sight, yet, Grimmjow still continued, "If I buy a sports car, he buys the sports car dealership. If I buy a yacht, he has to buy all the land around the dock to feel satisfied." Looking back at the girl, he told her, "in other words, even as soon as you yell: "Hey, you jerk!" One could say that he's even more wicked than me."

Blinking, the girl looked at him, confused. "What?" She blinked again, "what?" Snaking his arm around her waist, she told him: "What are you talking about? Why would I say that to you babe?" Clearly she meant why she would call him a jerk.

Sighing, he brought his hand up to her face and squeezed her cheek playfully, "Aww, our little Eriko Kimura. Because I spoke in a slightly roundabout way, you couldn't understand?"

She looked at him blankly.

"I'm saying: Let's stop seeing eachother. I don't want to see you anymore."

Her eyebrows drooped a bit, "What? Then, what was that kiss just now?"

He leaned into her, "A goodbye kiss. I want to remain in your memory," He clicked his tongue, "a sweet man..."

Angry, Eriko shoved him towards the gray car behind them, yet, she did not succeed. He stayed in place, a bit surprised.

"Hey, you jerk!" She screamed, close to tears.

As we let Eriko and Grimmjow settle that little predicament, let's see what Ulquiorra is doing... Shall we?

Ah yes...

* * *

Now, we find our hero of the story, Ulquiorra, walking through a marble hallway of an art museum.

The voice of a woman springs into his mind. It's of his mother.

 _"Her grandfather was a cabinet minister. And her father manages a hotel."_

Stopping a bit, he removes his hands from his pockets and places them at his sides. He then heads towards the direction of a young woman, with dyed mahogany hair and wearing a gray dress.

The words of his mother drifted back to him. _"She herself came back from studying abroad and is a Commercial-Film Director."_

He approached her silently, and as he neared her, she turned towards him, looking at him, smiling softly.

"Miss Yuka Fukuoka?" He asked.

"Yes?" She asked, fluttering her eyelashes.

"I am Ulquiorra Schiffer, your arranged match for this meeting," he told her.

"Ah, yes, how are yo-"

He interrupted her, "Follow me." Placing his arms behind him, he walked off to the left.

She looked at his retreating form, tilting her head to the side, _What is this guy thinking?_ she speed-walked after him, and caught up to him.

After looking around for a few moments, Yuka decides to speak up: "You must like Edouard Manet. As far as arranged match meetings go, I think we're probably the only ones to meet at an art gallery."

Not even looking at her, he replied, "Because I don't need to waste my time."

She looked at him, "By that, you mean..."

"From the distance she walks, her temperament shows. From her appreciation of art, you can see her level of culture. You can see if she's a woman that would go to an art gallery or a club." He stopped and looked her way, leaning down to her shoulder, "If she prefers perfume that's overwhelming or subtle. The answers come out more quickly." Turning away from a surprised and red faced Yuka, he looks the other way and keeps walking normally. "Do you want to drink something?" He asks and walks away.

She looks at him with wide eyes, and smells her clutch and jacket quickly before sighing, "Sheesh, is it too overwhelming?"

* * *

The scene changes to a neatly decorated patio with water fountains and trees. The sound that can be heard is the water from the fountain and the quiet chatter of all the other people in the area.

Sitting down across from each other are Ulquiorra and Yuka, Ulquiorra brings his cup to his lips, takes a sip, and puts it back down onto the table.

The awkward silence is too strange for Yuka and so she decides to speak up. "If you find this situation uncomfortable, we can leave. The adoptive elders-"

Interrupting her again, he asks, "Is this an uncomfortable situation?"

She looks at him strangely, "Isn't it? As much as we have over the average person, I suppose there will be things I'll need to give up. But, marriage based on status without any love..." She blinks, "I have no interest in that. To live just as a good obedient daughter, I'm too much of a hot-blooded woman."

Understanding what she means, he says, "So... you don't want an arranged marriage."

Looking away, she nods, "right."

"Why not?"

She looks back at him, eyes widened, clearly surprised. "Excuse me?"

Crossing his arms and leaning back in his chair he says, "love. I suppose there some that find that important. But because of the ignorance of the hormone and disease called love, you ignore family, education, and capability. You can't communicate and you're at different levels, and you think that those can be replaced by a good kiss?"

Yuka looked speechless, "Um, well.."

"You're quite naive, compared to the way you appear. Then I decline as well. Will you tell your family you get dumped? Then I'll match my story that way." Standing up, he faces away from her and buttons his blazer, turning back around he says one more thing before walking away. "Oh, and the Edouard Manet exhibit is next month."

Bringing her perfectly manicured fingers to her mouth, she sighs, shocked. "Um, Ulquiorra Schiffer."

* * *

The scene changes to a department store's cafe where two women are comfortable sitting in the luxury around them. The coffee table separating them held their tea and small pastries. One woman was wearing a long, green blazer with a cream coloured scarf and a short, shiny silver dress and the other was wearing a white cardigan with a short black dress. The woman with the long, green blazer happened to be Yuka Fukuoka.

"Really?" The unnamed woman asked our recently dumped rich gal.

Sighing, Yuka replied, "That's right. There hasn't been a man yet that hasn't fallen for my modern woman routine. But he walks off unaffected, looking totally appealing."

"So, you're saying you got dumped," the other woman said.

"Megumi, I'm saying I've finally found a connection."

Looking to her side the now named woman; Megumi, replied, "frankly it's a worry even if you do start dating." Looking back at Yuka, she continued "If he finds out about you and Pantera..."

Fustrated, Yuka replies, "Would you like him to know? If he knew, would he have come to meet me? Just drink your tea."

Trying to change the subject Megumi smiled a bit, "but out of all the department store VIP lounges, I really like this one the best. Even the cups are different. This is that expensive..." She takes a sip of her tea.

"Doenjang girl*" Yuka states.

Almost spitting out her tea, she asks, "What?"

"Doenjang girl*" Yuka replies again.

Looking around, the Megumi asks, "If a doenjang girl*, then what are you?"

Amused, Yuka replies, "Me? I'm an heiress." Her friend scoffed yet Yuka continued. "I don't know how they can so obviously announce they are daughters in law." Clearly addressing all the other women in the room. "They should wear name brands." Megumi looked down at her chest and brought a hand to it, not noticing this, Yuka continued once more. "Why slather themselves in it. Oh my. And what's her deal?"

"Who?" Megumi replies, looking at the doorway.

A young woman around their age walks in wearing black skinny jeans, a white t-shirt with a logo, a red flannel tied around her waist, and a black leather jacket. On her head was a blue hat that did not reveal her hair. On top of her hat was a pair of yellow headphones. As she walked in, her black worn out shoes made a squish sound which made all of the women stop talking to stare at her, then turned back to talk with their friends again, gossiping about the stranger that just walked in.

The raggid looking woman sat down at a table and removed her jacket, revealing a dragon tattoo on her upper arm. Megumi panicked a bit, even Yuka's eyes widened significantly and her mouth dropped.

"Oh my. Oh my gosh, oh my gosh!" Megumi exclaimed. "It's a dragon, a dragon." She said reffering to the dragon tattoo on the woman's arm. All the other women in the room shifted in their seats.

The woman lowered her headphones down to her neck and crossed her arms.

Megumi whisper-yelled to the older women sitting at another table to the side of her, "turn my son's heads away from her!" She then looked back at the woman with the dragon tattoo. From this statement, we can presume that the child in the woman's arms is Megumi's son. The old woman can be seen as her servant.

Looking mad, Yuka stood up and looked at the intruding woman.

Her friend looked up at her, brought her hand up and asked, "Hey, what are you doing?"

Placing her hands on her waist, Yuka replied, "I'm going to be the first lady of this establishment soon. How can I just sit and watch someone turn this into a corner mart? Shall I go and give her a piece of my mind as the first lady to-be?" Not waiting for an answer, Yuka turned her head back to the stranger and walked over to her.

"Hey! Hey!" Megumi whisper-yelled in panic. "Oh geez!"

Yuka stopped at the feet of the stranger. The woman in the chair looked up at her and Yuka noticed that the woman had bright orange hair that was neatly tucked into her hat. Unfazed, Yuka rose her hand and motioned a finger, "over here." She said loudly.

A young female employee with light brown hair walked over and placed a saucer with a cup coffee on it on the table in front of the stranger. "Just a moment," she told the woman with the dragon tattoo. She then stood up straightly and looked at the fuming Yuka in front of her. "Is there something you need, guest?" She asked as the stranger straightened herself in her chair and took a sip from the cup in front of her.

"Since when has the lounge's standards gotten so low? Isn't this a place for only for VVIP's who spend over 100 million won? Did you check everyone's ID when they came in?" Yuka asked harshly.

"Of course ma'am," the employee replied nervously.

"You are a liar!" Yuka yelled loudly, "you didn't!"

"Well, that's because all the employees know the guest by face..." The employee said nervously.

The stranger then stood up and looked at the employee, "I think she's talking about me," she said softy. The employee looked at her, "Give me the key." The stranger said. The stranger then turned to Yuka and said, "You don't have to take it out on the wrong person. I was on my way." Looking back to the worker, she said, "Thanks for the coffee. I'll see you later." Walking away, she took a set of keys out of the hands of the employee as well as her jacket on the chair.

"We spend the money in this department store, and it looks like the wrong person got the coffee." The stranger with the orange hair stopped walking. "What's your name?" Yuka asked the employee.

Panicking, the employee covered her name tag and then took her hand away. "I'm sorry," she then bowed to Yuka. "I'm really sorry."

The stranger then turned to her side to see Yuka walking to the employee. Yuka stretched out her hand and snatched the name tag of the employee, looking her fiercely in the eye before walking past her and the stranger. Angry, the stranger started after her, but the employee quickly took hold of her arm.

"Where are you going? We are looking at the 3 Disasters* here. Bureaucratic disaster, calamity, and gossip. Total bad luck here," the employee told the stranger.

"We have to get your name badge back," the stranger simply stated and started to walk again.

The employee stopped her again, "Oh! Don't make it a bigger deal. I just have to apologize and plead for leniency. I'll probably just get yelled at a little. Hold back."

"Why should you get yelled at? What are we always apologizing for?" Frustrated, she then walked out of the employee's grasp. The stranger the walked past the other tables and out of the doors of the cafe. She then took hold of the black bmx bike laid against the wall, but stopped when she saw Yuka and her friend along with the middle aged woman, holding Megumi's crying child as well as a lot of bags and a purse that all belonged to Megumi.

"Aigoo*, aigoo*, what's the matter? Aigoo*, is that so?" Megumi addressed her crying child. The stranger woman shoved her hands into her pocket and walked towards Yuka. Yuka saw the stranger walking towards her, and met her gaze, noticing that she had stormy gray eyes. As the stranger continued to walk to Yuka, she stopped when a man ran inbetween Yuka and her friend, snatching her purse from the woman carrying the crying child.

"Oh my, oh my! Oh my bag. Oh my! It's a thief! A thief!" The stranger woman looked at the man that snatched Megumi's purse as he raced inbetween a crowd of people, bumping into other people in the way. "Oh my bag! What about my bag?! Oh, my bag. Oh my bag!" Megumi screeched. The stranger woman looked back at the screeching woman as she yelled some more. "Do you know how much that costs? How could you hold it like that?!" She screeched at the mother.

"Oh I'm sorry Madam. My child was so upset." The baby still cried in her arms as the thief jumped into a moving silver van that then sped off.

"Why blame the baby?!" Megumi yelled at the mother. "Give me the child!" She took the child out of the woman's arms and looked at her. "Are you working with the thief by chance?! You're with him, aren't you?! You pay for it! You will pay for it!"

The stranger woman looked back at the direction of the thief and said to herself, "is this a bureaucratic disaster or a calamity?" She then looked back at the older woman in sympathy and said, "Stay here." She then ran towards her bike.

"What about my bag?" Megumi cried.

The stranger woman gripped the handlebars of her bike and ran, jumping on it and racing onto the street. Quickly finding the silver van, she chased after it, passing through a crowd of people on the street, and on top of a bridge. Stopping for a second to see where the car went, she found it speeding below the bridge she was on, and she peddaled down the stairs and onto the street once more. Seeing that the car was in a highway that was very familiar to her, she went through a short-cut around an alley. In front of her though, were two male workers carrying a large piece of glass. Finding no other way to get through, she lifted the bike and jumped over it, turning to her right to see the silver van right where she wanted it. The men behind her exclaimed in surprise and astonishment. Following it down a curved street, she turned back onto the sidewalk when she saw the van speed off into a crowded street, almost crashing into a red truck that blocked the way of the stranger. The woman jumped over the red truck and followed the van into the crowded street where she finally caught up with the car and stopped the bike in front of it, forcing the car to stop with a screech. Breathing hard, the stranger woman saw 4 men step out of the car. She quickly threw her bike at the fist man to approach her, quickly taking him out. The next man to approach her jumped in the air, twisted and aimed is leg towards her head. However, she ducked under it and punched him square in the face once he landed, sending him to the side, knocking him out. The other two men teamed up and attacked at the same time, both sending a kick on either side of her, she ducked again and made them kick each other at their calves sending them both to the ground. One of them stood up, and charged for her, but she quickly grasped his shoulders and headbutt him sending him down again. His partner sat up and she took the moment to bring her leg up and slam it down against his head, he then knocked out. The first man that she threw her bike at had recovered and ran towards her from behind, aimed to punch her in the arm, but missed and hit her arm. She looked at the man behind her and twisted out of his next attack, which was a chop aimed at her neck. She turned around and kicked his side, then rose her arm over her head to which the man did the same. They crossed arms, and she took that moment to punch him in the back several times. She then let go, jabbed him in the chest, and took hold of his head, which she then threw towards the hood of the van, making him fall onto the ground.

* * *

The scene changes back to Yuka and her friend, now accompanied by two policemen. The policemen were speaking with Megumi and writitng down what she said while Yuka stood with her arms across her chest. Megumi held a tissue in her hand, and wiped a few tears from her eyes before blowing her nose.

"I was cleaning my baby's nose, a thief appeared and ran off that way!" Sniffling a bit, Megumi pointed off in the direction that the thief and the stranger woman had gone off to.

Sighing in annoyance, Yuka turned to face her friend, "do you have to find the thing so badly?" Her friend looked at her and lowered her arm a bit. "What kind of bag was it?"

"Looks like we've dodged a bullet." Said a voice. The stranger woman walked towards Yuka and her friend, handing her a black bag with a silver chain. "It's this one, right?"

Before she could respond, Yuka took the bag out of the stranger woman's hands and threw it at her friend, which seemed smart to her, but in reality looked very, very dumb. "See if there is anything missing." Was all Yuka said.

The stranger spoke up, "Since I got your friend's bag back, why don't you forget about what happened in the lounge earlier? Give me her name badge."

Yuka blinked slowly, "I don't have it."

The stranger woman waited a few seconds, "I'm sure you have it."

Yuka shrugged and looked to the side, "I threw it away."

"You threw it away?"

Still not looking at the woman in the eyes, Yuka pointed and said, "If you look through the trash can by the entrance..." The stranger woman grabbed a-hold of the collar of Yuka's blazer she picked her up and leaned in meanacingly. Her friend gasped, and rose her hands up. This scene was a funny sight, since Yuka was a great 5 inches taller than the stranger woman, and the stranger woman was so petite looking.

"Which trash can by the entrance?" The stranger woman said, "The woman who spends 100 million won in a department store, and the woman who gets a cup of coffee from a friend... a trash can is just as dirty to both. I believe the person who threw it away should pick it up."

Yuka closed her eyes and reluctantly said, "Fine. I'm not such an inflexible person." Grabbing at the woman's fingers, trying to pry them off, she said, "let's forget about what happened."

The stranger woman's grey eyes blazed with fury, "It's a little too late. I'm not so flexible you see." Dragging Yuka by the collar, Yuka and her friend shouted at the woman to let go, but she walked both women inside the department store and threw Yuka against the balcony next to the trash can. "Find it." She said, motioning her head towards the trash can.

"It's not this trash can!" Yuka yelled pointing to the object that no one wanted to go through.

"So, find it." The stranger woman replied. "So I can see if it's this one or not."

Yuka scoffed, and looked away. Sighing in frustration, she brought up her bag and opened it. Reaching inside, she dug around for a few moments before bringing her hand back out and stretching her arm out towards the stranger woman's face. In Yuka's hand was the name tag of the female employee. "We're done now, right?" Yuka asked in anger. The stranger woman looked down at the name tag in Yuka's hand and looked back up at the woman. "Take it! So, I can go!" Yuka exlciamed.

Looking at Megumi, the stranger woman asked, "You're going to throw that away, right?" She took the tissue out of Megumi's hand and took Yuka's purse, putting the tissue in the bag. She then threw it harshly at Yuka.

Yuka gasped in surprise, and exclaimed, "Are you crazy?! What the hell are you doing?!"

"Because that must be a trash can." Was all she said before snatching the name tag out of Yuka's hand, turning, and leaving.

Yuka gasped in disbelief, "How can someone be like that?!"

Megumi sighed and smiled, "Really. How can a woman be so cool? I wonder what she does..."

"HEY!" Yuka yelled loudly.

* * *

The scene changes once more to a thunderous night sky with various buildings with their lights on. On top of one building, though, there was a pillar that stood up 10 feet above the building's roof and connected to it was a thunder pole. On that thunder pillar, was our stranger woman, clad in all black fighting armour. The stranger woman, though, looked very strange, stranger than usual. Her hair was a dark shade of brown designed in a pixie cut that framed her face and her eyes were a deep onyx. She was looking at the sky, in her own thoughts, but then she is seen looking down and smiling. She then stands up, looking down below her, she put both hands at her side and firmly grasps the guns strapped to her thighs. She pulls both guns out and cocks them. She raises her gun carrying hands to her sides in a low-V. She then lets herself fall forward into the sky, head down, speeding towards the earth. She brings both guns in front of her and pulls the triggers once. The two bullets, travels down, revolving in a circle, until they hit the glass roof of a building. The roof shatters and she falls through the sky and into the building. People inside the building carrying knives, tomahawks, swords, and daggers, all look up to where the intruder had entered. A second after landing on her feet with a back-flip, many people came forward and charged at her straightaway. A man came around and attacked her with a large knife to her side, but she flipped around and shot him. After, 5 others jumped off of structures to charge at her as well with knives, yet, she dodged them all and shot them as well. Other foes decided to climb up quickly on the walls and structures, however, that was a bad mistake. Like the others, she shot each one at a very high speed and managed to hit every single one, with perfect aim. The woman back-flipped onto a structure and shot some more people before grabbing onto an pole and rode it down to the floor while shooting more of her enemies. She then brought the pole back up- somehow- and landed back on the platform she was standing on before. Seeing that there was just a few of her enemies left, she jumped off the platform and twisted her body into various spins before settling down on solid ground. Looking around and counting the number of enemies around her, she noticed that they all had brought out their swords and huddled around her. There were 16 of them. Slipping her guns back into their holsters, she reached behind her and brought out a large sword. Deciding to attack first, she jumped onto her first victim and quickly sliced his throat. Moving onto her next victim, she stabbed him in the chest and brought her sword back out, which hit another person in the stomach behind her. Quickly slicing this way and slicing that way, and ducking this way and charging that way through all the others, she made her way down to her last foe. While her back was turned, he charged towards her and jumped into the air, she sensed him and too, jumped into the air, kicking her feet to gain more height. Their swords clashed on the way up, but while returning to the ground, she sliced open his chest and landed back on the ground. The body of her last foe landing with her, on its side, dead. She paused a few moments, regaining her breath, before turning her head to reveal a whole different person. Literally. The woman standing there looked nothing like our precious stranger woman.

"CUT! OKAY! OKAY!" Yelled a man sitting in a chair.

It was action movie scene.

"Ah, this is tiring! Oh my legs! Oh my gosh! Why don't you look where you're walking?! How dirty!" A woman dressed just like our stranger woman hopped out of the scene and asked, "Director, did I come out looking cool?"

The director, a man in a brown beret and glasses said, "Why should you look cool. you should look pretty. An actress doesn't need anything else. You just need to be electrifyingly pretty." Behind him, our mystery woman looked down at her feet and turned away, ready to leave.

"Oh, Director! Being pretty, that's one thing I can..." The mystery woman walked away from the director and the snobby main actress.

"Orihime!" A man shouted. Our mystery woman turned. "Good job. You looked cool today."

Our mystery woman- now named as Orihime, smiled widely and bowed, "Thany you." The man nodded, smiled, then turned away, doing the stuff he's been paid to do. Meanwhile, our beloved Orihime looked down shyly at the floor, and her right leg bent and she tapped the toe of her boot towards the ground repeatedly. Turning away happily, she walked away. However, the main actress, now recognized as our dear Eriko Kimura, the same woman that Grimmjow had dumped recently, purposely bumped into Orihime and pushed her off to the side.

"Just because she wears the same costume and same makeup, does she think that she's the star? As a stunt flack!" Eriko exclaimed rudely. Her moment of happiness now ruined, Orihime sighed and looked down.

* * *

The scene changes to our beloved Orihime Inoue, which I am able to reveal as our main female protagonist, leaning against a large white van with a logo on the side of it: 'Stunt School.' She is wearing the same yellow headphones as before, but this time, her hair is fully revealed, as well as other things. Her hair is a vibrant shade of orangey-sunset that reached her waist in waves. Her gray eyes were once again gray, proving that she had been wearing black contact lenses when in the shoot, and as for her hair, it had been tucked into a very good brown wig, I mean, it covered all that hair! Also, her bust had changed significantly, I may add. The bandages that she had been wearing before to make her figure smaller and much more boyish looking to resemble the main actress, Eriko, had now been long gone, letting Orihime feel free and less restricted. Some may say that her body, in it's original form, resembles that of a goddess.

"I'm looking there, at the space where you once were." She sang, hearing the sound of the car's trunk being opened, she lowered her headphones to her neck walked there to see her stunt crew packing up. "Are you finished?" She asked.

Their group director, Ichigo Kurosaki replied, "We're moving to the next site."

"Oh," Orihime nodded.

"Are you getting comfort from Pantera?" Ichigo asked. His long, strawberry coloured hair was tied back in a half-up-half down do was blowing in the wind.

"Excuse me?" Orihime questioned.

"I heard Eriko Kimura said something again."

"No."

"What did she say?"

"It's alright. It doesn't concern me if she does or not."

One of her fellow crew members, Kiego Asano, spoke up, "Right, don't even worry about it. You're a hundred times prettier than that chick, so she's just jealous."

Orihime smiled and blushed a bit, "I know. According to the lighting team, people say I'm 120 times prettier." Everyone stopped packing up, confused to what she was trying to say. "Geez, I don't know why my mother gave birth to me this way." Ichigo smiled at her playfulness as she brought both of her hands up to her face in a cutesy manner that squished her cheeks together. "Even if I just try on some sample cosmetics, my skin's as fine as rice flour without a blemish in sight." Releasing her cheeks, she says, "And whatever I wear, the fit is unbelievable."

"Ouch" The other men, Yasutora "Chad" Sado and Uryu Ishida, they all know knew her real intentions. She was poking fun at what Kiego had said.

"I thought that things would get better as I got older, but with every year, it gets worse than when I was a teen. It really drives me crazy. Thinking about it, my mother was pretty."

"Ah really!" Kiego exclaimed, wrapping a large blue cord around his arm, "why did her mother have to be so pretty? It's not like we can file a complaint."

Stomping in a playfully manner, she said, "That's what I'm saying!' Holding her hands out to offer her help to Kiego, she said, "give it to me, I'll.."

"That's alright," Ichigo said. He then reached out to her and picked up her headphones, replacing them onto her head, with her music still playing. "Finish listening. If you sing, even better." He then backs away and helps out the other men to finish loading all the heavy material into the car. "Hey, hurry! Let's go, let's go!" Ichigo ordered.

Orihime, feeling very useless, sighed quietly and leaned against the van again, shoving her hands into her shorts.

"All right! We're moving fast!" Kiego complained. "Gosh, why so fast?"

"You better hurry up," Chad remarked.

Ichigo looked back at Orihime's relaxed frame, and saw that she was silently singing to herself again.

"At the space where you once were. I'm looking there. Though I know that you won't come. That's the only way. I can tire and fall asleep. Because I can't, even for a moment try to erase, you from my love. When I open the door, I feel like you will be there."

* * *

The scene changes to the action school. It is a warehouse with many windows that let the sun reach in, and student were performing all sorts of stunting acts on the mat ground.

Our great Director, Ichigo, was walking on the second level's platform and walked around a corner, entering a room with rows of beige lockers. This was the locker room (duh). He opened one of them and reached into his pocket. He retrieved 2 tickets that were labeled, _Once More:_ _Pantera 2015._ Grabbing a tan backpack out of the locker, he unzipped the side and put the tickets carefully into the bag. He then reclosed the locker and leaves the same way he came from.

* * *

The scene changes (I'm doing these repeatedly, aren't I?) and we are taken to a stadium full of people and there were giant posters that all read "Pantera' or 'Once More' posted on the walls and balconies.

"The sudden sound of rain," a male's soothing voice sang, "I feel like I can hear. After I fall asleep." As the crowd cheered for the artist onstage, the singer is suddenly revealed to be our strangely familiar Grimmjow, blue hair and all. As he passionately sang on some more for his beloved fans in the crowd, it can be seen that Orihime and Ichigo are in one of the booths. Orihime was waving her arm to the beat of the song along with the crowd, and Ichigo had his arms crossed, a content look on his face. Ichigo looked down at the orange-haired beauty standing next to him, and leaned down to her ear.

"I told you to take a friend."

Turning the the taller man, she tip-toed up to his ear and told him, "I don't have a friend that would come with me. All my friends like idol stars." She then relaxed her feet and rose her arm into the air again, waving it side to side, smiling widely. Looking at her, Ichigo smiled as well.

Somewhere else in the crowd was ^surprise surprise^ our hero, Ulquiorra Schiffer, sitting down looking bored out of his mind. He yawned, and knowing that he couldn't take the torture of hearing his cousin sing, stood up to walk out. However, the woman next to him, who looked very similar to Ulquiorra, grabbed his arm and pulled him back.

"Grimmjow-Senpai will be sad if you leave. There aren't many songs left, just be patient." The woman said.

"I can only take so much." Ulquiorra complained. "How is it that the guy's talent keeps falling since his debut?"

The woman, whom I can reveal as Saki Sciffer, is Ulquiorra's younger sister, scolds him, the fans will hear. If you go, I'll tell Grimmjow-senpai not to renew his contract."

Ulquiorra raises a brow at this, "Did Grimmjow pay you money? To watch me?"

"I'm a major stockholder in Pantera. You just try and leave," She told him.

Sighing in defeat, he tilted his head back and closed his eyes in annoyance, crossing his arms.

Someone else in the crowd was tentatively watching the great Pantera perform onstage. It was Yuka Fukuoka, remember her? She was too, crossing her arms, and she was wearing a yellow trenchcoat with brown buttons. As she looked down at the blue haired man onstage project himself through his music, there was a look in Yuka's eyes that was very strange. Her almond shaped eyes were glassy, and at the brims were.. tears? Possibly, but probably not.

As Pantera finished his last note, the crowd cheered and the scene faded into black.

* * *

The scene reopens and now what can be seen is the same car that Ulquiorra drove in the morning moving towards a building with a large poster of Grimmjow's face. How horriying.

Ulquiorra stops the car infront of the building and steps out, he is immediately greeted by many men in business suits, and as he walks away without saying a word, they all follow him like lost puppies.

Ulquiorra walks through the doors of the establishment, with the men behind him. He heads towards the escalators and steps on, with the men behind him following suit. At the top of the escalators are many people formed in a straight line, that are sharply dressed in the employee's uniform. It is safe to assume that they are employees of the establishment.

As soon as he steps off of the escalator, everyone bows in unison, and Ulquiorra passes by them, hands in his pockets, not even glancing at them. Going around the corner, there are more people in uniform and they immediately bow at the sight of him walking towards them. He walks past them and steps onto the escalators again, all of his men following him. He walks off and walks past some more employees, and as they bow, he just continues to walk. This repeats itself a few more times, until he reaches the final escalator that leads him and his men to his office. After they leave, the women standing next to the escalator stand up from their bow and one of them can be recognized as the female employee that Orihime talked to.

"Why does that guy always come this way when there's a perfectly functioning elevator?" The woman next to her complains, rubbing her sore arm.

"Who cares?" Said Orihime's friend, "I like seeing his face. How can a person be so good looking?"

Her coworker sighs, "what's the use of being good looking when he doesn't work? Does is make any sense that he comes in just 2 days a week? That's why rumours start that the department store will change ownership. They say that General Manager Park has been signing in place of the President."

Orihime's friend gasps, "really? General Manager Park?"

Quietly, her coworker nods.

* * *

The scene changes to two middle-aged men walking through a very organized hallway. One of them is carrying a black folder with paperwork inside. As they walk past a table with office chairs, the one with the folder rudely pushes the chair and it crashes into the table and pushes other chairs out of order. Both men walk past, unaffected by the ruckus they caused.

"The decor in this office... We'll have to change all of it, when it becomes your office." The youngest of the two said as they approach a black, shiny office table

The older man slams the black folder onto the marble table. He looks at the other man, "Look here Manager Choi."

The younger man looks startled, looking down he replies, "Yes General Manager."

The now introduced General Manager looks at Manager Choi sternly, "What should we change first?"

Managaer Choi looks up, confused, "Excuse me?"

The General Manager laughs, mouth fully open. His laugh is then joined by Manager Choi, who catches on quickly to his little prank. The General Manager claps his hand in excitement, and walks around the black marble table, and pulls out the very comfortable looking office chair out from under the desk.

Grabbing onto the silver block at the head of the desk, he points it to the General Manager. "First of all, this name plaque."

Sitting down, the General Manager laughs loudly along with Manager Choi, "The name plaque, that's good!"

Their scheming laughter is abruptly cut off when the door opens, and Ulquiorra walks through, hands in his pant pockets in an aloof manner.

The General Manager quickly scrambles out of his chair and puts it back into place while Manager Choi frantically cleans the silver name plaque with his blazer sleeve and puts it back onto the table. As Ulquiorra nears the two managers, they bow as to show respect, however, Ulquiorra passes by them as well. Clearly not caring for their respect. Ulquiorra goes around the table and before he can sit down, the General Manager sets the black folder down on the desk.

"It's the plan for the Annual Fall Sale," says the General Manager.

Ulquiorra points to his chair, "I haven't even sat down yet."

"Please understand, I'm just as anxious as I'm heading the staff."

Ulquiorra looks at him with a straight face. "If you were so anxious, why didn't you sign it? You can't duplicate my signature yet?"

The General Manager takes an intake of breath, "rumours are just rumours. This is because you don't come into work-"

"I do come into work, on Tuesday and Thursday," Ulquiorra interrupts.

"You should also come in Monday, Wednesday, and Friday," the General Manager speaks up.

"I don't want to. Because of traffic." He simply states, and then sits down. All of the men behind the General Manager speak quietly amongst themselves at this statement.

Ulquiorra sighs and fixes himself into his chair, and picks up the folder, looking at the cover, he says, "is this the best you can do?" He puts it down and looks at the General Manager with his green-snakelike eyes. "You're sure?"

From the back Manager Choi speaks up, "I'm not sure but... What specifically don't you like about it?"

Ulquiorra fixes his emerald eyes upon Manager Choi, "how would I know? I've only read the title." The men next to Choi look to themselves and mutter a few words before becoming silent again.

"If this isn't the best you can do and you're aren't sure of it, then you should re-do it," he tells Choi. He then looks up, "What do you think, General Manager Park?"

After a few moments, General Manager Park responds, smiling fakely, "I will put together a new plan as soon as possible."

Ulquiorra, not amused at all, grabs the folder, and throws it at him. General Manager Park misses, and the folder lands the the head of the desk. Gingerly, he reaches out to grab it, and takes it. He then leaves the room in a huff, and Manager Choi runs after him.

* * *

The scene changes once more and a house with large glass walls and white furniture inside can be seen. A group conducted of 3 males can be sceen. The group included a tall man with brown hair with one very long stand that stayed inbetween his eyes, another tall guy with light blonde hair that framed his face and wore a melancholic smile, and the last male was very tall with blue hair. The man with the blue hair cannot be mistaken for none other than Grimmjow, our beloved main protagonist's cousin.

"A 7th album has his dignity. How can we film a music video in this country? You saw the concert sold out. What's the problem? And I can be the lead actor." Grimmjow explains to them.

"That's the problem. That." The brown-haired man says, "There's not one MV director that wants to work with you, okay?"

"Why not? For what reason?" Grimmjow complains.

The brunette looks at him haughtily. "For what reason? Why don't you touch you chest, will you?" He then smacks Grimmjow lightly in the chest. It can be seen that these men are either friends or partners in some sort of business, with the way they addressed eachother and treated eachother. As they enter the house, the conversation continues.

Confused, Grimmjow dumbly brings a hand to his chest and taps it, and then leaves his palm flat against his chest. "I just did. Aizen-sama, why? What?"

The man in the middle, now named as Aizen, says, "you don't feel anything?" Aizen then walks ahead of Grimmjow and the blonde man.

With his hand pressed to his chest, Grimmjow says, "I do." He then brings out his other hand and starts to squish his pecs, as if he were groping a woman's breasts. "I guess my chest has gotten kind of droopy." He scoffs, clearly bullshitting the man in front of him. The blonde man hides his laughter and faces the other way.

Aizen looks at him with an annoyed look. Pointing a finger at Grimmjow's chest, he says, "Look dumbass. There's no one in this industry that doesn't know you're a bastard who'd slap a Hollywood star in the face! It even showed up on the X-Files that you threw a script at SBC Director Choi!"

"Drive me nuts! When did I throw a script?" Looking away, Grimmjow continues, "I threw a synopsis."

Aizen gave him a fake sympathetic look. "Really, you did? Then next time, be sure and throw the script too! Aigoo*, this guy." Sighing out loud in frustration, he turned to leave.

"Where are you going?!" Grimmjow demanded.

"I got to find a MV director, don't I? Before you decide you'll be the director too!" Bringing his palm to his face, he facepalmed and then left. The blonde man, whom was standing behind Grimmjow, bowed at his retreating form, and then turned to Grimmjow.

"Why would I be the director?" Grimmjow asked dumbly to himself. He then smiled, "That's all right. Should I just be the director this time? Then, there's no problem, right?" He asked, turning to the man next to him.

The blonde man looked at him and stated bluntly, "You'd look pathetic." His melancholic smile seemed to stretch further, if possible.

Grimmjow, surprised at the man's response, lifted his arm upwards in a smacking position. "Gin, you little..."

The man- Gin's eyes widened, revealing stunning aquamarine orbs, and he started running away from Grimmjow.

"Stand still, stand!" Grimmjow yelled, his arm still raised. He then stopped once he saw who was at the door.

With his arms in his dress pants pockets, Ulquiorra stood by the glass door. His dress suit looked quite handsome on him. His pale skin created a good contrast with his blue button-up shirt and gray blazer. A chain could be seen hanging from his vest, connecting down to his vest pocket, how classy of him. "You have time, right? I'd like to go and get a drink."

Grimmjow looked at his cousin strangely, Ulquiorra never offered to go drinking with him, come to think of it... He never drank. But instead of making a remark about it, he noticed someone standing behind Ulquiorra, and said, "Looks like you're the one that won't have time."

Ulquiorra rose an eyebrow, and slowly turned to look behind him. It was General Manager Park, with a file in his hand.

Bowing to Ulquiorra, General Manager Park said, "This is the updated Annual Fall Sale plan."

Bringing out his wrist to check the time, he looked once more at General Manager Park, "within 6 hours?"

"It is not my style to procrastinate," replied Park.

* * *

The scene changes to a room with dark tinted tables and shelves leaning against the walls that all held many books. The walls were painted white and the walls across from the tables were all made of glass. Looks like Ulquiorra is a fan of transparent architecture. We can infer that this location is either a library or a study.

At one of the tables, stood General Manager Park and sitting in front of him was Ulquiorra, whom was looking through the file. "Is this the best you can do? Are you sure?" He flipped through more of the pages carelessly.

"Yes," was Park's reply.

Ulquiorra looked up at him, his green eyes blazing, "really." It was more of a statement than a question. "The contents are exactly like the Spring Sale. You just changed the label to Fall."

"Because it's an event that we've held for several years, the scope of what it can encompass is more narrow than one would think."

"What are you going to do if it's wider than one would think?" Ulquiorra closed the file and brought his hands together. "General Manager, do you want to drive a compact car and register for free giveaways? You don't, right?" Ulquiorra sighs and leans back in his chair. "Because you drive a much nicer car with the salary I pay you. Then can't you create something more sensational and appealing? By taking the scrapings from their pathetic lives as they register in 100 won coins just to drive a compact car, do you think life will improve?" General Manager Park looks down at his feet. "If it were me, rather than a compact car, refrigerator or vacuum, I'd prefer top star Song Mo Yang's airport fashions, I'd say give me the bag Song Mo Yang carried, the coat she wore, the watch... why? Because a luxurious wallet that appeals to my vanity is much easier to open than one that smells like side dishes, and money would flow out easier too. And, that way. General Manager, your wallet will continue to be nice and full. What do you think?"

General Manager Park, with his mouth agar slightly, says, "What you say isn't wrong. As usual. Then, what about main model Pantera's contract renewal?"

Ulquiorra sighs and regretfully says, "we must do it."

"Because the rise in American tourists, his sales are increasing..."

"I know..."

"In the case that you can't resign him?" Park says, a bit too comandingly.

"Didn't you just hear me say we must do it? Are you lecturing he because you think I can't, or worrying because you think I won't?" Taking his phone out of his pocket, he dials a number and says, "if I said I'd do it, I will, don't you think?" He then brings the phone to his ear. "Be ready in 10 minutes," he says before hanging up and looking fiercly at General Manager Park. "What are you doing, standing there?!" He motions with his chin, "go on." General Manager Park is left with no other option than to leave, and he does so. But in a silent huff.

* * *

The scene changes again to a blue dimmed room. A band is playing a soft jazz and a woman is singing. Her velvety voice sings the song: **_Cry Me a River_** by Ella Fitzgerald. Many people are in the room, dressed very eloquently and are settled all around the place, drinks in hand. As the onlookers of the drama, we can see that this place is a bar, but for fancy and rich people. We can see Ulquiorra and Grimmjow seated in a booth.

"When was the last CF you shot?" Ulquiorra asks, "has it been a year?"

Grimmjow takes a sip of his brandy, and looks at Ulquiorra weird, "what do you want to know that for?"

"Every time I turn on the TV, there a tons of hot new kids. But I see you boldly haven't signed the contract renewal."

"Is that why you wanted to have drinks?"

Ignoring the question, Ulquiorra replies, "this 7th album may be your last chance to go out on top. And it may be your last chance to have a contract with out department store."

Grimmjow scoffs, "that's what you think."

"Have you ever known my thoughts to be wrong? Actually, money, isn't an important factor for you or me. For this contract, just take enough to appease your pride. I'll fib and triple the amount on the press release."

"You said money isn't an important factor for either of us, so why am I the one to take a hit? Why don't you just give me more?"

"I can't do that. Then my pride would be hurt."

"What? Oh geez, really! I'm not doing it, not doing it. Don't even dream of a renewing the contract. I'm getting up. There's a girl at the bar who hasn't been ab;e to take her eyes off me."

Smirking and showing off his dimples, Ulquiorra says, "It's not you. She's looking at me." He then takes a sip of his Jack Daniels.

"Are you cross-eyes? She's been trying to catch my eye ever since I came in."

"Because I won't look at her."

"Huh! Drive me nuts. She's probably my fan. Shall I ask her?"

"You're reaching?"

"Wanna bet? I'm going to ask her."

"You may get beaten to death. She's a woman I had an arranged match meeting with."

Grimmjow blinked. "What?"

Directly across the room from their booth was a woman dressed in a skimpy cheetah print dress. She was sitting all alone and was looking at Grimmjow and Ulquiorra.

Ulquiorra put his cup down and stood up, buttoning up his blazer. "Seriously, come with your signature stamp before I find a hot kid. I won't wait long." He then stepped out of the booth, and left.

Grimmjow hurriedly stepped out of the booth as well. Pointing at Ulquiorra's retreating form, he yelled, "Hey, hey! Aren't you gonna pay.." He then stopped speaking when he saw the woman with the skimpy dress follow Ulquiorra's form as he left. Putting his hands on his hips, he sighed and shook his head. But then.. something caught his eye.

A young looking guy sitting behind a piano was singing and playing at the same time. Looking at the man in surprise, Grimmjow placed his arms at his sides, and looked directly at the performer. He was blown away by the young man's talent. At that moment, Grimmjow's phone rang and he reached to grab it. Seeing who it was, he frowned and took out the battery. Grimmjow looked back up at the performer, and focused.

* * *

The scene changes to an angry Eriko Kimura, dressed in the same outfit from the fighting scene that our beloved Orihime Inoue took part of.

"Senpai, why are you avoiding my calls?!" She screamed into the phone. "You didn't answer any of my calls, but you answered After School's Yoon Hee's call. Why take just her calls? I've got nice thighs too." Next to her was an awkward Orihime, who fell victim to listening to Eriko's bickering. With nothing else to preoccupy herself with, she found herself playing with the hilt of a sword prop that was lying next to wall next to her. "I've got hot legs. You saw! We can't break up like this. We've opened up our filming location today, and there are a ton of reporters here. I'm going to let everybody know about our relationship. Got it?!" Hanging up, she stared at her phone angrily.

Feeling sorry for Eriko, Orihime passed her a fresh water bottle from the stand next to her. Eriko, totally not sensing the compassion Orihime was trying to show her, greedily snatched the water bottle, and took a sip. Noticing that the person that handed her the bottle was Orihime and not another stage helper, she asked: "How long have you been here? Why hang around here?"

Looking at Eriko with contact covered eyes, she answered, "The director asked for us to practice the fight scene."

Looking away from our heroine, she shouted. "Oh piss me off!" Looking back at Orihime she whined, "why do we need to do it again? We already did it a ton!"

Looking sympathetic, Orihime replied, "We have to practice more. This scene has complex copper wiring, so a slight mistake could cause an accident-"

Eriko interrupted her, "Did anyone ask you to talk back?" Scoffing abnoxiously, she said, "Fine. I'll do it. Let's do it!"

Nodding to her, Orihime bowed respectively and led her outside. "Okay, let's go slow."

"Come on, come quickly!" Some of the stage crew members ran around with various equipment tools.

"One, two, three, four." Orihime counted as she clashed swords with an unenthusiastic and very bored Eriko. "Let's do it again. Now, one, two, three..." Getting angry with Orihime, Eriko waved her sword violently against Orihime. However, her plan did not go as planned when Orihime's reflexed kicked in and she ducked under the swing. This resulted in Eriko stumbling forward and tumbling forward.

"Oh god!" Eriko screeched at the top of her lungs as she tumbled towards a pile of sword props and large shards of glass. Orihime's reflexes kicked in again and she grabbed Eriko by the shoulders and flung them around, allowing Orihime to take the fall. They landed on the pile of swords, and broke some of the glass. Hearing the screams of Eriko, many people from the stage crew ran over to see what was the comotion all about.

"What the hell is going on?!"  
"Are you alright?" Came the many concerned voices of the stage crew and other actors as they came to help the crying Eriko. As they lifted Eriko off of Orihime, she sat up and winced at the pain coming from her left arm. There was a large yet not too deep gash that was a result of a shard of glass piercing her skin.

"My fingernail! Look at my fingernail!" Screeched a crying Eriko. "It's bleeding! Don't touch it!"

Standing up warily, Orihime, slouched a bit in order to hide her bleeding arm. She quickly grabbed her jacket and put it on, in order to further cover up her injury.

"Eriko!" Came a booming voice. It was the Director of the film. "Eriko, are you hurt?"

"My finger! Blood! Don't touch it! It hurts like crazy!"

Worried, Orihime walked to Eriko and asked, "Are you very hurt?" Instead of receiving an answer, she got this instead:

"Orihime Inoue, are you in your right mind?!" Yelled the Director of the Film. "How can you make such a mess of the lead actress's fingernail?!"

Bowing deeply, she sincerely replied, "I'm sorry. I'm sorry."

"We have to film, so what are you going to do about it? Huh?!"

Bowing again, and mustering all of her strength not to show her pain, apologized again. "I'm truly sorry."

Walking into the situation, came in Ichigo with a very serious face with Kiego, Chad, and Uryu in tow, all looking equally concerned. "What are you sorry about?" Then looking down to the crying Eriko, he aked her, "So why didn't you practice when we asked you to?"

Ignoring his question, she shouted, "What am I going to do about my fingernail?!" She then again broke out into tears.

"Look here, Director Kurosaki!" The other director yelled. "The actress is hurt."

Looking at Orihime, Ichigo snatched her sleeve and Orihime cried out in pain. "Does she look fine to you?" The sleeve was covered in blood from her arm.

"It's fine," Orihime told them.

"This is fine?" Ichigo scolded her. "What are you, Wonder Woman?!"

"I'm really fine. I can do the shoot," Orihime tried to calm him down.

"Are you rebelling right now? You're an actress too. Someone's crying and making a fuss over a fingernail, and you're going to treat you body like that?!" Ichigo reprimanded her.

"Look here, Director Kurosaki. How can you talk like that? Do you want to have your entire team pulled out?! Huh?!" The other Director shouted, clearly bluffing.

While Orihime looked downright terrified, Ichigo looked cool as ice, "I'm already planning to pull them out." Looking up at Ichigo, Orihime looked very panicked, yet Ichigo continued, "I can't let my people work at a site like this." Gasping, Orihime looked from Ichigo to the other director. "What are you doing just standing there? Gather up the props!" Ichigo ordered the stunt team. He then walked away through the crowd.

"Director!" Orihime called after him. She spun around to face the Film Director, and bowed. "I'm sorry. Just a moment." She then spun back around and ran after Ichigo, holding her injured arm tightly.

Leaving the Director and everyone else behind, the Director decided to yell out a few things that came to his mind. "He gets a taste of the American waters and he thinks nothing can touch him?!" Below him, Eriko scoffed grimly. "Ah, my blood pressure!" The Director.

* * *

A set of pills were placed on top of a coffee table belonging to a patio couch set. The person who placed the pills onto the table was a middle-aged man that was dressed in very dignified yet casual forest green trousers and matching blazer with a cream coloured button-up below it. His mouth held a very suspicious smile that did not reach his eyes and he had a somewhat tired face. The man's shoulder-length blonde hair pointed outwards and ontop was a green hat. Sitting across from him was Ulquiorra, dressed in a shimmery blue tracksuit. It would look very tacky on others, yet it somewhat suited his slender yet muscular figure.

"If it's alright, I'm thinking of reducing your medication," said the man.

"Don't reduce it. It makes me nervous," Ulquiorra replied. "Urahara, at this rate, do you think I'll ever be able to work a normal schedule?"

"Do I look like a quack to you? I told you I'd help you do that." The now, named man, Urahara said with a slight frown.

"Ayyy, be nice to me. What kind of doctor acts like that?"

"If you don't like it, you can change doctors." Changing the subject, Urahara said, "is it still too hard to get in an elevator?"

"If its just hard, then I'd bear it and ride on. If I even go near one, I can't even breathe. What if rumours about my condition start to spread in the company?" At that moment, Ulquiorra's phone started to ring. Looking at it, he told Urahara, "Just a second." Before putting the device against his ear. "What?"

"You're just hanging out right now, aren't you?" The person on the receiver said, it was Grimmjow.

"I am, when am I not hanging out?"

"Then, there's a place called French Town in Kagamino. If you go there, you'll see them filming a movie. The lead actress is Eriko Kimura. Just hold her for 3 hours."

"Are you taking drugs too now," Ulquiorra joked blandly, "I'm hanging up." He then began to turn off the call, but stopped when Grimmjow spoke again.

"Just a sec, just a sec!" Grimmjow pleaded. "I'm in the middle of recording for Chocolate. I just dated her really briefly, but she's a total nutcase. If Aizen-sama finds out, I'm dead!"

Ulquiorra looks at Udahara and waves at him, letting him know that their session had ended. Udahara nodded and brought his hand to his ear, motioning for Ulquiorra to call him once he had the chance. Ulquiorra nodded, and Udahara gathered his things and left. "Was Aizen-sama such a respectable guy?" Ulquiorra asked Grimmjow.

"Eriko Kimura says that reporters are headed to Aizen-sama's business building. She must be the type that's totally been around the block a few times." Grimmjow complained.

Leaning back in his chair, Ulquiorra sighed, and crossed his legs. "Sounds just like your style."

"Please. She says if I'm going to break up with her, I need to pay her compensation. She says she has pictures of us fooling around in a hotel."

"Do you think she's the only one that has those kinds of pictures? Why don't you collect them and make a book. Bye." He then again tried to turn off the call, but stopped when Grimmjow spoke yet again.

"Are you really going to be like this?" Grimmjow complained. "Fine, bring me the contract. I'll sign it. Bring it."

Perking up at the idea of Grimmjow signing his contract made him sit up in his chair. "Where in Kagamino? I just have to find the lead actress, right? Ah, right, but you know... You don't need a contract deposit, right? The economy is tough, after all," Said Ulquiorra with mock sympathy.

Gasping with enthusiasm, Grimmjow spoke, "You jerk. Didn't you say you'd uphold my pride? How much is my pride worth?!"

* * *

The scene changes back to the action movie set. Orihime can be scene, still in costume, standing in front of the Film Director. She was still grabbing onto her injured arm. "Director," she called to him, "I'll work really hard. Please let me continue working on the film." She then bowed deeply to him.

"Why are you asking me? Did I pull the team? Director Kurosaki says he's pulling the team." Was the Film Director's response.

"It's all my fault. This sort of thing won't happen again." Orihime then bowed again. In the background though, Ulquiorra can be seen walking down the brick stairs that led to the set. His hands were shoved in his track-suit pockets and the collar of the sweater reached over his mouth.

"Again, why are you talking to me about it?! Am I going to have hold, carry, and baby the stunt director now?!"

In the background, Ulquiorra taps the shoulder of a sleeping man sitting on the stairs. With absolute politeness, he tells him, "Excuse me, sorry to wake you." Looking around, he asks, "Which one is Eriko Kimura?"

The man looks up at him and thinks, "Kimura-chan?" He looks around and speaks, "Over there." He points to a bowing Orihime. He clearly did not notice that the woman he pointed to was only dressed like Eriko, and not her at all. The Film Director gets up from his chair and leaves Orihime still bowing.

"Ah, thank you. Sleep. Sleep well." Ulquiorra tells the man and then walks towards Orihime. The man nods to Ulquiorra and drifts back to sleep. Orihime stands up from bowing and unknowingly walks towards Ulquiorra's direction, looking at the floor in shame. Seconds later, Ulquiorra's and Orihime's bodies met, and Orihime looks up at him while Ulquiorra looked down at her.

"You know Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez, I mean Pantera, right?" Asked Ulquiorra.

"Pantera?" Orihime looked up at him with glossy eyes.

"You don't know him?"

Orihime, breathed out and crossed her arms slowly, still careful with her injured one. "What if I do?"

"Let's go. Pantera wants to see you."

Orihime blinked, her contact covered eyes looking bewildered. "Me?"

* * *

A car drives down a tree covered highway, and the car can be identified as Ulquiorra's silver porsche. Inside was Orihime, sitting in the passenger seat, and driving was Ulquiorra. Orihime's hands were on her head, she was holding onto the wig that was placed onto her head. She was afraid of it flying off, therefore making the Film Director even more angry with her. She also decided to keep the wig on in order not have to go through the hassle of having to put it on again over her waist length-sunset hair. It took her nearly an hour just to put it on! She's not gonna go through that again!

"Can't you put the top up?" Orihime asked, her hands still grasping at her head.

Still watching the road, Ulquiorra replied, "If I was going to put the top up, why would I have bought a convertible? Where is it?"

Orihime looked at him, "what?"

Not answering her question, he tells her, "He said he wants to see you at the hotel where you first met. Where is that hotel?" Orihime just looked at him strangely and did not respond. "Have you been to so many that you don't remember?"

Looking ahead of her, Orihime answered, "Hotel Ritz, room 1103."

Ulquiorra turned his head to look at her, his green eyes widened a bit. "1103?" Looking back at the road, his lips pressed together in a straight line. "Gosh really. All you need is 4 walls. You're no mountain lions! Why go up so damn high?!" He yelled in anger. Orihime just looked at him, started at his sudden outburst, without a word, she looked down at her lap and back to the fuming Ulquiorra. "11..." He smacked the steering wheel in anger.

* * *

At the hotel lobby, Ulquiorra stood at the front desk, was handed a room key, and then walked towards Orihime whom was waiting with a group of people in front of an elevator. He stopped at her feet, took one nervous look at the metal contraption before handing her the room key. "You go on up first." He told her.

She looked up at him, "Why?" She asked.

"I'm..." He trailed off. He looked at the elevator and sweat appeared on his temple. "A person that can't be seen with a woman in a hotel." was his lame excuse. The people around Orihime looked nosily to Ulquiorra and all looked at the pair with confused expressions on their faces. "If you find out later, you might think, "Oh dear, I dared to try to go up a hotel elevator with a man like him?" I'm that level of a person."" A man standing next to Orihime chuckled at Ulquiorra's arrogant response. Orihime turned to the man and looked back at Ulquiorra in slight embarrassment. She then looked him up and down, and looked back at him, not believing what he had said. Ulquiorra noticed her staring at his track suit. "Ah, these clothes." He laughed softly in a prideful tone, "I really didn't want to have to do this." He turned around and unzipped his sweater, and folded back the collar, showing her the tag.

 ** _Ding._** The elevator door opened, but Ulquiorra did not notice. He was too busy trying to show Orihime the tag of his sweater. Orihime smiled at the sight of the elevator doors opening and quickly walked in, without telling Ulquiorra anything. All the other people walked in as well. "Can you see? You know what this is, right? This training suit..." He then looked behind him, and saw that no one was there. He then looked at the elevator, still awkwardly holding the tag of his sweater out. There, he saw Orihime, quickly press the elevator button and awkwardly look back at him, then looking away once the elevator doors closed. Standing back up, he gasped and zipped up his sweater again, zipping it all the up to his mouth. Looking around awkwardly, he puffed his cheeks and breathed outwards, sighing.

* * *

Entering a tan room with cream-coloured furniture, Orihime looked around and thought back to the day she had first stepped into that very apartment.

 ** _flashback_**

 _"Orihime Inoue?" called a woman._

 _Orihime looked over from where she was standing to see who was calling her, and as soon as she saw who was with the woman, she quickly pulled off the blue wig she had on. Orihime was wearing a brown blazer and a matching pencil skirt. Her bosom was remarkably flat, thanks to all the bandages that she had used to flatten her size DD breasts. It was very, very uncomfortable, but she had to do what she had to do in order to get the job done correctly._

 _The person standing next to the woman that called her name was Grimmjow Jaquerjees, in all his glory, walking into the room wearing a dark business suit that fit him perfectly. In his hand was a cup of water._

 _"Orihime Inoue, say hello," said the woman._

 _Orihime frantically tugged and pulled at the hair tie that held her long vibrant hair, and flattened it down at her scalp._

 _"Ah, Riku Suzambo's double?" Grimmjow smiled warmly, a trait he somehow seemed to posses. "I look forward to working with you."_

 _Orihime smiled widely, and bowed, "I look forward to working with you." Ou_ _r beloved Orihime looked down shyly at the floor, and her right leg bent and she tapped the toe of her sneaker towards the ground repeatedly._

 _Taking a sip from his cup, Grimmjow looked down and noticed Orihime's foot tapping against the floor. He looked back to her face that was still smiling idiotically and said, "if I ask you if you'd like to have coffee, you won't puncture a hole in your sneakers, will you?"_

 _Orihime looked up at Grimmjow, her gray eyes glossened with surprise, "excuse me?" She looked down at her feet and laughed nervously, "ah," she then stopped her foot from tapping and set it down on the ground normally. Grimmjow laughed at her cuteness, but was interrupted when the woman standing next to him pointed him towards the camera man. Orihime turned and smiled widely like a school-girl._

 _"We'll shoot the next one. Why isn't Riku Suzambo here yet? We're just waiting." Said Grimmjow._

* * *

Meanwhile...

Ulquiorra sighed in exhaustion and grasped the railing of the stairs he was currently walking up. He was already on the 20th flight of stairs and he was very much so close to passing out. He felt like he had just ran a marathon, but he knew that he wasn't even close to the designated floor he was supposed to leave on. Grabbing onto the railing, he walked up a few more stairs before almost falling off, his hands were very sweaty at this point, and the tracksuit wasn't helping.

* * *

Back with Orihime...

Walking through the doorway of the dinning room, Orihime looked around the room, paitently waiting, with a water bottle in hand. She had gotten it from the kitchen's mini fridge. Settling down on the couch, she opened her water bottle, and heard the clock chime, "Five o' clock," in a cutesy manner.

"Five o' clock," Orihime repeated in an equally kawaii voice. As she took a drink from her bottle, she heard the door open and looked to see who it was. And... in came a sweaty, exhausted, looking Ulquiorra. His shimmery blue sweater was unzipped all the way, revealing a black undershirt. His black unruly hair was even more unruly and his once-abnormally pale face was humanly red.

Looking at her in exhaustion, he noticed Orihime carrying a water bottle, and a look of complete happiness glimmered across his stotic face. "Water," was all he said before walking around the couch and towards her and taking it out of her delicate fingers. Plopping down on the couch he leaned back and took greedy gulps out of the plastic bottle. Leaning forward, he hunched over and gasped for breath. Placing the halfways full water bottle on the glass coffee table infront of them, he reached behind him and began to remove his sweater, placing it onto the table next to the water bottle once he had removed it. "Won't you feel uncomfortable?" He then asked between gasps. "You'll probably have to be alone with me for about an hour. He began to fold the shimmery sweater neatly.

Orihime blinked, surprised at the scene that had just unraveled before her eyes. "Are you uncomfortable?" Ulquiorra, still breathing deeply took the water from the coffee table. "In my line of work, I'm always with me." At these words, Ulquiorra choked on the water, and quickly placed it onto the table again.

Looking at her, he told her, "I see you've been around the block more than a few times. How long has it been since you've seen Pantera?"

Orihime looked at the ceeling and thought briefly before replying, "It's been quite a long time. I didn't know he'd remember me." She said with a smile.

Ulquiorra, now breathing steadily, said, "You're face is memorable enough," Orihime looked at him, "You seem pretty straightforward, and I'm not the type that can keep quiet, so I'll ask..." He paused, "about how much do you make? When you're with a top star like Grimmjow-san?" Orihime tilted her head, she was confused all right. "Didn't you shoot some pictures here? Then how much do you get paid for compensation for something like that?"

"Are you talking about a guarantee?" Orihime asked, confused of what the man was asking her.

Ulquiorra scoffed, smirking a bit, "Ah, well call it what you like. I'm just curious about the amount."

"I don't get paid more for doing it with a top star. Though, I do get a little more if it's the countryside or out in the open."

Ulquiorra blinked, "o-out in the open?"

"Rooftops and bamboo groves seem to be the current trend, you see."

Ulquiorra's eyes widened to saucers, "Bam-bamboo groves?" He looked away, clearly flustered by her answer. "Wow, Grimmjow-san, really!" He started to chuckle.

Orihime continued, "The pay is the best in a car. Probably because it's so hard."

He looked at her again, and stopped laughing, "ah. A car." He nodded with slight disbelief. "Of course, it's hard. Uncomfortable and cramped." He motioned with his hands a cramped space by squeezing a ball of nothing inbetween his palms. "But... men like it." He remarked.

"Of course. Men like speed and excitement," She nodded.

Looking at her with widened eyes, he told her as she propped her head on her arm which rested on her knee, "your personality is quite interesting. How can you be so matter-of-fact about..." Not knowing how to word out his next question, he came up with, "Still, aren't you a little ashamed? You are a lead movie actress, after all."

She lowered her arm and looked at him strangely, "lead actress?" She asked. She looked away from him and looked down at her lap, and noticed the clothes she was wearing. They were her stunt double clothing. Figuring out what was happening, Orihime sighed out loud and laughed. She looked at him, "excuse me. What's my name?" She asked.

Ulquiorra blinked. "What?" He was not expecting that question.

"I asked, what's my name? Who am I that Pantera asked to meet?"

"Eriko Kimura," replied Ulquiorra, now he was the confused one. Orihime laughed loudly, she grabbed onto her stomach because after a while, it started to hurt. All Ulquiorra could do was watch her laugh comically and be very, very confused to what was currently happening. Sighing and calming down, Orihime remembered the stranger sitting beside her.

"Hey..." Was all she said.

"Hey?" Ulquiorra repeated.

"Are you from some hick town? How long have you had this job?"

"Hick town?" Ulquiorra asked, a bit offended.

"Life in Karakura is hard, isn't it? Still, what the hell is this you're wearing? Pantera has his reputation to look after." She then grabbed his sweater that was on the table and flopped it back down, the zipper making a soft click sound once it hit the table.

Ulquiorra looked at his tracksuit, very flustered and the slightest bit, annoyed, "I knew you were thinking that." He grabbed his sweater and pointed at it. "What were you doing when I showed you earlier?" Orihime gave him a dirty look, and Ulquiorra chose to ignore it. "This time, take a good look." Turning the sweater this way and that, he showed her different parts of the fabric, "in Italy, a master craftsman, by hand..." Losing interest, Orihime sassily looked away, which made Ulquiorra stop talking. He threw his sweater onto the table and sighed in annoyance. "What was he thinking with a girl like you?" Orihime looked back at Ulquiorra with a look that read 'This dumbass...' However, Ulquiorra was unable to see it because he was dialing a number onto his phone, "It's not like I should be fighting with you as a man on culture." He finished dialing and put the phone to his ear. "Where are you?" He demanded, "you said you'd be here soon, so why aren't you?!"

"The filming was delayed. Just 2 more hours." Came Grimmjow's voice over the phone. Getting frustrated with this whole situation, Orihime snatched the phone out of Ulquiorra's hand and held it against her ear.

"Excuse me." She said politely, "It seems like you asked this guy to grab Eriko Kimura, but this moron got the wrong-" She was then interrupted by Ulquiorra snatching back his phone and frantically hanging up.

He looked at her in disbelief, "You're not Eriko Kimura?" Orihime said nothing. "Who are you? If you're not Eriko Kimura, why'd you come along?"

"Did you ask me if I was Eriko Kimura? You asked me if I knew Pantera."

Closing his eyes frustration, he waves his phone at her, "Do.. do you know how much this deal is worth? What are you going to do? How are you going to take responsibility?!"

"Responsibility? Why should I? I thought you were just a moron, but you're a total whack job." Her phone started to ring.

"What? Whack job...? You-" He was interrupted by Orihime's hand covering his mouth as she put the phone to her ear. "Yes Director Kurosaki! Yes!" She paused, "Really? Of course!" Getting rid of his shock at her bold move, he took her hand off of his mouth as she started to bow to no one. "Thank you! Thank you very much!" Sputtering, and trying to wipe his tongue of her hand, she silenced him by putting a finger to her lips. He then licked his own lips. "Are you still in Kagamino? I'll be there in 30 minutes. I'll go now." She said all of this with enthusiasm. She hanged up the phone, smiling to herself, and stood up to walk past Ulquiorra and out of the room, however, Ulquiorra stopped her by throwing his leg in the air at her direction. This action made her look down at him.

"Where are you going? And another thing, how can you get to Kagamino in 30 minutes?"

"Do you want to meet Eriko Kimura?"

"What?" Processing what she asked he answered, "yeah."

She looked at him with a mysterious look in her contacted-covered orbs. "Then give me your car keys."

* * *

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" Yelled Ulquiorra at the speed of his car that Orihime was driving. They were on a somewhat packed freeway and Orihime was blazing through the lanes. It was a wonder how she did not hit any of the passing cars since she was driving so fast. A few more minutes of Ulquiorra's terrified screams had passed and before he knew it, the ride was over and Orihime parked outside of the gates belonging to the film site. Unbuckling her seatbelt, she opened the car door and stepped out, and Ulquiorra followed quickly after her, still shell-shocked at Orihime's driving. As soon as they were out of the car, Ulquiorra bent forward and coughed, looking like he was about to puke.

From the other side of the car, Orihime looked at the man, confused at his actions. "What? Didn't you say men enjoy car scenes? Here," waving her arm, she threw him the keys. Turning around, he quickly caught the keys. "Look for a woman that's dressed just like me. That's Eriko Kimura." She then shut the car door and ran inside the gates with the speed of a horse.

Standing up, and catching his breath, he looks at her running and yells, "That's not what you promised! You have to find her for me first!" But... she's already long gone. Sighing, he reaches into his car and grabs his sweater, and a man in a hat walks up to him. It was the same man who pointed to Orihime and called her Eriko Kimura. "Ay, this guy, really. Why do you keep coming?" Ulquiorra tells him.

The man, whom was holding a pole says, "You can't get autographs during filming." The man then walks away inside the film set.

"You think I'm here for autographs?" Ulquiorra calls after him. He looks down at himself and continues, "these clothes aren't what you guys think they are." He walks after him and points to his sweater, "A master craftsman in Italy who made training suits for 40 years, by hand..." He stopped speaking once he realized that no one cared. "I'm sweating, sweating." Lifting his hand, he called to the man again, "never mind about that. Where is Eriko Kimura right now, eh?"

* * *

Various camera flashes go off from cameras belonging to paparazi and many magazine photographers. Many of the reporters spoke all at once, and asked many questions to the woman sitting behind a table with microphones built up all around it. "Is it true you are dating Pantera? Or is it just a rumour?" At this question the woman, now identified as Eriko Kimura, began to cry loudly, her body wracking in sobs. Across the room, a man wearing a sparkly blue tracksuit walks in through the doors. It was Ulquiorra. As he walked in, he notices many reporters and cameramen surrounding the crying Eriko, and many reporters began to shout many things all at once. Eriko looked all around her and began to speak to each reporter, feeding them lies and gossip about her relationship with Pantera, and at this, Ulquiorra sighs deeply, very annoyed. Not wanting to bring attention to himself, he zipped up his sweater all the way up and covered half of his mouth, making his identity a secret. Shoving his hands into his pockets, he walked all the way over to where Eriko was sitting. At the sight of the blue wearing stranger, the noise in the room lowered significantly, and all eyes were on him. The only noise that was heard clearly was Eriko's fake crying. As soon as she noticed that she was no longer the center of attention, she stopped crying and looked up to see who it was. Stopping at the head of the table, Ulquiorra took out his wallet and picked out a gold card from one of the slots, he then laid it in front of her. It read:

 _ **Espada  
** International Department_ Store

 **CEO** ** _ウルキオラ シファー  
_** **Ulquiorra Schiffer**

Erko's eyes widened when she read the card. She then looked up at him with afraid eyes as he leaned onto the table and came at eye level with her. He even lowered his collar from covering his mouth and in a low and threatening voice he demanded, "Do you know I've been looking for you all day?"

Eriko blinked rapidly and managed to stutter out a, "m-m-me? Why?" She tried to act as innocent as she could.

In a sarcastic tone, he replied, "would you belive me if I said I was your fan?"

"R-r-really?" She squeaked.

"Because you'll be elegant as well as intelligent, right?" His green eyes sparkled with humour.

"Excuse me?"

"Moreover, there won't be a scandal either."

"Scandal?" Eriko repeated, she laughed nervously and looked away from his piecing emerald eyes. "Yes." She responded.

* * *

Leaving the building, Ulquiorra dialed his cousin's number onto his phone and put the phone to his ear, waiting for the idiot to pick up. "Yeah, it's me."

"What happened? What did she say?" The blue-haired idiot asked. "Did the reporters leave? What did she go on about? Did you make sure that she didn't jabber?"

Walking down stone stairs, he replied, "Cousin, why don't you stop jabbering? I'm trying to tell you..." he stopped speaking when he heard the sound of swords clashing and rapid footsteps. His eyes tried to find the location of the sound. Not interested in the conversation anymore, he said, "I'll call you later," and hung up. Below him, was a group of males with swords surrounding a female. The female happened to be Orihime, still dressed up in her stunt-double costume. The people around her dashed towards her and began fighting, as well as completing series of unnecessary-yet awesome fight moves. Orihime was visibly sweating from the workout, and strands of the brown wig clung to the sides of her forehead. She was no longer wearing her jacket which made her bandaged arm visible, and there was some blood seeping through. Spinning and twisting and jumping, she clashed swords with some and sliced easily through others. The way she was fighting against her foes created the illusion of some hypnotic dance, and Ulquiorra seemed to be entranced and trapped in it. As he watched her fight against her enemies, his entire being went still, and he felt like it was only him and her in the world... which was very odd, even for him.

* * *

Half an hour later, the whole set crew were packing up and setting things into yellow storage bins and pilling them up inside of a large U-Haul truck. The filming was all done for the day, the sun was slowly setting, creating patterns of the colour pink that splattered all across the sky. A very tired Orihime walked out of a green painted building, a large plastic bag in her hand which held the costume she was wearing before which included the high heeled boots, leather skirt, leather shirt, leather gun and sword straps, and the brown contact lenses. She was still wearing the brown wig, since it was quite chilly outside and the wig was warming her head. She also hadn't bothered to remove all the bandages from her breasts, compared to her bra, she'd rather wear the bandages instead since they did not pinch the bottom of her breasts as much. She was wearing dark-washed jeans, a gray shirt and a black jacket over it, the same one she had worn when she was injured earlier that day. Looking to the left of her, she looked to see if she saw anyone on the stunt crew nearby. She turned around and nearly jumped out of her skin when she saw Ulquiorra standing there, his hands in his sweater pockets. "You were a stuntman?" was the first thing he said.

Relaxing herself, she sighed in annoyance at the sight of him. "It's stuntwoman," she corrected as she walked past him. Seeing the costume maker of the cast, Orihime walked to her, "Ah, I need to return this." She handed the woman the black bag.

The lady inspected the clothing in the bag and said, "There's blood on this. Ah, its expensive leather too." The woman sighed and looked up at Orihime, spotting the wig, she said, "I'm going to need that too."

"Eh?" she asked, and then felt for her head, feeling the wig, "Ah, I'm sorry, here you go." She pulled the wig off carefully, releasing her sunset hair which was tied in a tight bun on her head. Orihime handed it to her, bowing, "Sorry about the blood Miss." Upon seeing Orihime's orange locks, his green eyes widened and he took a sharp intake of breath, and it took him all of his willpower not to reach over and untie it. He really felt the need to run his hands through it. Orange was his favourite colour after all. Turning back around, Orihime saw him still standing there, not noticing the strange look of need on his face. She asked, "did you find Eriko Kimura?" She then walked past him, expecting him to follow her.

Snapping out of his trance, he did follow her, and replied, "Thanks to you." Trying to talk about what he had just seen, he said, "But you do quite an interesting job. Is it that you are not bright? Why do such physical work?"

Upon hearing this, she stopped walking and looked up at him, a bit angry. "Are you curious? Shall I tell you? It comes in quite handy at times like this." In one solid and fluid motion, she stuck her leg out and brought it down on his shin, hard. Surprised at her action and the sudden feeling of pain, he bent forward and grasped his throbbing leg. Calmly bringing her leg back down to the floor, she winced at the reoccuring pain in her arm, that burst in motion made her arm feel very irritated. She brought her other arm to grasp her injury and started to walk away from him.

"What the hell?! Why did you kick me?!" He yelled at her in pain. He started to chase after her, limping as he did.

"Why do you think?" She snarked at him.

"I really was asking because I was curious. Why resort to violence?!" He yelled. "I'm not the kind of person to look down at someone who isn't well educated." He tried sticking his arm out to catch up to her and use her for balance.

"How excellent of you. But, be thankful I hurt my arm today. Otherwise, you'd be dead," she told him.

"You think I'm a fool? You think I don't know it's makeup?"

She winced in pain, the irritation was getting worse. "It's not makeup. So, get lost."

He limped on, getting closer to her, he was now behind her. "Not makeup, my foot. You better stop right there!" He yelled. "If you don't want to meet my lawyer, you better apologize..." He pointed at the floor for a moment and saw something strange. He stopped yelling once he knew that what he was looking at is a trail of blood on the floor. He looked up at her and saw that she was swaying side to side, her hair bouncing left and right as if she were in a drunken state. Realizing that she may be badly hurt, he ran faster to catch up with her, limping quickly. Getting to her side, he grabbed her other arm and yanked, stopping her from walking away. "Did you really get hurt?" He asked, concern in his voice.

Orihime looked around frantically, looking out for any members of the stage crew. "Be quiet."

Looking at her bleeding sleeve, he demanded, "Let me see," and he yanked it down to reveal her very bloody arm. The cut was very large and long, the flesh around it coloured a deep purple.

She gasped loudly and winced in pain, "what are you doing? Not letting go?" She tried to break free, but he didn't budge.

"Are you crazy?! In this state, you went with me and then did all that action earlier? Are you nuts? Are you stupid?" He lightly smacked her on the forehead and she winced again, this time because his hand was cold, "it's true you're not so bright." Looking at her forehead, he noticed some strands of her orange hair glued to her forehead, she was sweating. He brought a hand up to her head, and then placed both of them at either side of her neck, "And you're burning up!" He yelled at her.

She threw his hands off of her, "move your hand!" She yelled, startled at such bold physical contact.

* * *

Ulquiorra's car pulled into the driveway of the Emergency Rooms Wing of Soul Hospital. Quickly getting out of the car, it could be seen that Ulquiorra was on the phone. "We'll go into the emergency room for now, but come quickly and take a look at her wound." He spoke. On the other side of the car, Orihime got out and started walking away from the hospital's entrance. Turning around, Ulquiorra saw her leaving and so he ran after her and grabbed her uninjured arm. "Where are you going?" She looked at him in the eyes, and that's when Ulquiorra noticed that her eyes were in fact gray, not brown. This fact almost distracted him from her response.

"Let go. I told you I'm alright." She tried turning again, but he stopped her.

"If you're all right, why are you shaking?" He smirked, "are you trembling because you've never met someone as good-looking as me?" She looked up at him, even more annoyed. "I'm saying this just in case you might misunderstand. I'm not doing this for your sake. This is the ethics of the leadership of society. It's a kind of good deed, a good deed. This is how I was taught at home. So even if you're shaking to death, bear it." Orihime's eyes were blazing with fury, she expected him to bend in fear like other men, but he stayed still, his face now serious. "Otherwise I'm going to throw you." With that being said, Ulquiorra bend down and placed an arm behind her legs and the other one behind her back. He lifted her upwards and like nothing, carried her in his arms. With this movement, Orihime gasped, not only from the pain, but from the surprise that he was able to just throw her around like that. She looked at him frantically as they walked inside and she fidgeted her legs, but... she stayed quiet.

* * *

As soon as they were given a room, Ulquiorra placed a passed out Orihime onto the cot, gently not to wake her. Her injury had been addressed and she was now resting safe and sound. A few minutes later, Ulquiorra had returned from a water break and he walked in quietly. Hands in his pockets and mouth somewhat covered up by this collar, he silently examined the sleeping woman in front of him. Looking to the side of her, he noticed that her sweater was strewn across the counter, and made way for it. He grabbed it, and was suddenly overwhelmed by the smell of strawberries, he stiffened again. It was not too powerful, nor was it too soft to smell. Awakened by his phone ringing in his pocket, he quickly folded it and neatly placed it onto the counter again. Grabbing his phone, and looking at the caller ID, he sighed when he saw who it was. Grimmjow. Bringing the device to his ear, he said this, "I'll talk to you when I get home. I'm at the hospital right now." Without waiting for a response, he hung up and put the phone back in his pocket. Looking below at Orihime, he sat down in the chair that was seated next to the bed. He then looked at her face, and brought his own down to her level. Even in her sleep, she looked frustrated and worried. Her eyebrows furrowed together and made a line inbetween, she looked a bit angry. She fidgeted a bit and then became still once more, but her face remained the same. Ulquiorra looked at her, his own eyebrows furrowed in concern. He brought his hand up to her face, and gently raised the skin inbetween her eyebrows, making her face look relaxed again. Slowly moving away, he admired her hair and slowly brushed his fingers through a lock, and then he set his hand down beside him. He mustn't get too carried away. "Now, you look better," he whispered to her.

"Better? She looks the same." Came an amused male voice.

Ulquiorra jumped from this seat and turned around, seeing Udahara standing there, his arms crossed. "Aish*, you scared me."

"Who is she? Are you dating?" He asked, a sly smile on his face.

Ulquiorra almost blushed like a wildfire, which is not like him, "it's not like that." He looked back down at the sleeping woman, what was happening to him? "I don't know her. I met her for the first time today." He answered honestly.

Udahara rose an eyebrow, "so... because of a girl, you don't know and just met, you called me out on one of my treasured weekend nights? Me, a psychologist, not an internal medicine doctor?"

Ulquiorra looked at his psych and waved him off, "that's all details. You're just giving me a headache."

Udahara uncrossed his arms and placed them at his sides and waved them around a bit, looking whiny, "I was enjoying myself at a party. What are you going to do about that?" Ulquiorra sweatdropped, but lucky for him, a Orihime's phone started ringing.

"Uh, the phone's ringing." Turning away and very grateful for the distraction, he reached out and took the ringing phone from the sweater pocket that he had just folded on the counter. The caller ID read: **My Boss _._**

Hesitating a bit he thought, S _hould I answer?_ Deciding that it would be for the best, he picked up and put the phone to his ear. "Hello?"

"Isn't this Orihime Inoue's phone?" The man on the other side asked, it was Ichigo. Not answering, Ulquiorra looked down at the resting Orihime below him. "Hello?" Came from the other end.

 _So that's her name,_ he thought.

Breathing, Ulquiorra asked, "This woman's name is... Orihime Inoue?" He tested out saying her name, it rolled off his tongue like velvet. _Such a pretty name._

"Who are you?" Ichigo asked, worried, what if something happened to Orihime?

Ignoring his question, he asked, "Her name is Orihime Inoue, and how old is she?" Bending over to inspect her face carefully, he said, "she doesn't have a baby face."

"I asked who you were!" Ichigo was growing impatient.

On the other side of Ulquiorra, Udahara looked at him strangely. _Why does he want to know this girl's age? This isn't like him._

"Why don't you answer the question? Why ask such stupid things?" Ulquiorra demanded. "If I tell you who I am, would you know?"

Udahara frowned and reached over to take away the phone. Ulquiorra looked at him with an annoyed expression and Udahara met his gaze. "Couldn't it be her guardian?" He asked him. Ulquiorra shrugged, and Udahara put the phone to his ear, "Hello? Ah yes." Making his way out of the room to receive a better reception, he continued speaking, "I'm Udahara Kisuke, a psychologist at Soul Hospital. About the paitent, the owner of the phone..." The conversation continued outside the room, which left Ulquiorra by himself with a sleeping Orihime.

Looking her up and down, Ulquiorra noticed that her feet were poking out of the mustard-yellow coloured blanket. He noticed that her socks had some sort of logo on them, curious, he tilted his head and walked over to the to her feet. Pulling back the blanket slowly, he revealed... socks with an animated image of chibi Grimmjow's face on them... They were fan merchandise socks with hearts on them, in the middle reading, "Pantera Forever!" With eyes as large as saucers, he looked at Orihime, and then back to the socks, several times. Frowning and showing his dimples, he reached out and carefully... pulled a sock off. He then did the same to the other. The other one, however, was somewhat difficult to remove, and when he did, her whole leg jumped up. Startled, he checked to see if she had woken up, but to his relief, she had not. Making a disgusted face at the socks, he let them drop into a garbage can that was placed under the bed. Putting his hands on his hips, he sighed, proud of his handiwork, and he saw Orihime cutely snuggle into her pillow.

* * *

Meanwhile...

A black suv drove through traffic in order to reach the hospital. The driver was racing dangerously through the lanes, yet he did not flinch at the words or abnoxious honking of the road-raged drivers around him. His expression was of deep worriedness, and his eyebrows were furrowed.

* * *

Back at the hospital, Ulquiorra walked back into the room where Orihime was in, returning from another water break. When he entered, he heard Orihime speaking, and this worried him. "I'm sorry," she mumbled, breathing hard. "I'm sorry," her head was rustling through the pillows, left and right.

He looked at her in disbelief, "This woman's sleeping habits..." he mumbled to himself.

"I'm sorry," she cried out.

Bending over, he touched her awfully warm arm, "look here. It's a dream, a dream. No need to apologize."

"I'm sorry," she pleaded in her sleep.

Concerned, Ulquiorra shook her a bit, and Orihime's eyes snapped open. Looking around frantically and breathing hard, Ulquiorra started to speak again. "See, I told you it was a dream." Still looking around, Orihime analyzed her surroundings and quickly sat up. "Why get up?" Ulquiorra asked, "a sedative was prescribed, so for a couple hours-."

"Director," Orihime interrupted him. Looking away from her and at the door, Ulquiorra saw a man around his age with spiky orange hair. The man was fairly tall, and lean-built with peach skin and brown eyes. He was wearing black cargo pants, a tight white shirt with a label that read:"15", and over it was a gray windbreaker jacket. The stranger approached the pair, well, _we_ know that this man is Ichigo, but Ulquiorra doesn't.

"What the hell is wrong with you? If you were so injured you should have asked to be taken to the hospital!" He yelled at Orihime, completely ignoring Ulquiorra.

Orihime flinched and slightly leaned away, "I was all right earlier," she said quietly.

"You were all right earlier, you were all right yesterday..." He said referring to when he had asked if Eriko Kimura made fun of her. "You've seen enough people lose their arms and legs with that attitude!" He breathed, "if you're going to be like this, then quit." Orihime looked up at him, feeling small. "Why go back to that site? Don't you have any pride?"

Orihime gulped and bowed her head, "I'm sorry."

Ulquiorra frowned again, "This woman's always apologizing asleep and awake." Turning to the mystery man, he said, "Excuse me, please lower your voice. This is a hospital."

Noticing Ulquiorra, Ichigo rudely asked, "Are you the one that answered the phone?"

"Are you the one that called?" Ulquiorra striked back.

Not looking away, Ichigo asked Orihime, "Who is this punk?"

"This punk?" Ulquiorra scoffed, "who are you calling punk? Do you want to meet my lawyer?"

Worried that one of them may start a fight, Orihime interjected, bowing lower, "I'll explain the details." However, she bowed too much and the medicine made her dizzy, causing her to fall over to the side. Quickly reacting, the men tried to grab hold of her, but Ulquiorra was the only one that successfully grabbed her. While Ulquiorra was looking down at her in his arms very worried, Ichigo had an arm stretched out, and Orihime was looking straight at it, her gray eyes dazed. Looking up at Ulquiorra whom still had her in his embrace and looking back down at her, everyone stayed quiet for a few moments before she looked down and pushed away from him, a slight blush on her face. Looking up at Ichigo, she said, "He's just an errand man for Pantera."

Both men's eyebrows rose. At the same time, they spoke.

"Errand man?" Questioned Ulquiorra.

"Pantera?" Asked Ichigo.

Orihime continued, "You don't have to be concerned about him. I won't let this sort of thing happen again..."

"Look here." Ulquiorra spoke, "Orihime Inoue, of unknown age." Orihime looked up at him, "I'm not the sort of man you don't have to be concerned about. I told you. "Oh dear, I dared to try to ride an elevator-""

Orihime interrupted him, "I've been treated now. I can go." with that, she started to get up but feeling very dizzy, she fell over again, and Ulquiorra caught her once more. Feeling faint, Orihime put a hand to her forehead.

"You can't even put on your shoes, what are going to do?" Ulquiorra scolded. Ichigo leaned forward and pushed Ulquiorra from Orihime and snatched her away. Ulquiorra landed in the chair that he was previously sitting in, _What the fuck?!_ He yelled in his mind. Ichigo grabbed Orihime's sweater from the counter and lifted her, the same way Ulquiorra had when he first got to the hospital with Orihime. Her yellow sneakers came towards his face and he leaned back, "o-oh." Not looking back, Ichigo walked away with Orihime in his arms. "That woman's traveling from arm to arm today," Ulquiorra sighed.

* * *

Exiting the doors of Soul Hospital, Ulquiorra heard people speaking. Looking at the direction of the sound, he saw Orihime and the orange-haired man talking. "Are you going to be stubbon?" said the man.

"The drugs have worn off. I'm really all right. This isn't my first time in and out of a hospital," Orihime responded.

"Are you that uncomfortable with me driving you?" Ichigo asked, a sight frown present on his face.

"I'm sorry," Orihime apologized.

Ichigo nodded, disappointed yet understanding her need for privacy, "Make sure you take a taxi, okay?"

Orihime smiled, "yes, I'll see you tomorrow," she then bowed to him. Nodding, Ichigo walked to his car, opened the door to the driver's seat, got in, then drove away. Sighing and smiling softly, Orihime reached for the back of her hoodie and put it over her head, she then walked away. Seeing the whole scene, Ulquiorra stared at her, then looked away, walking away as well.

* * *

Driving around a corner in his sports car, Ulquiorra looked off into the road and saw Orihime walking up ahead. Wheeling closer to her, he sighed and sped up the car, trying to get away from her. Looking at her from the side mirror, he sighed again and pulled the car over. _Why am I doing this?_ he thought as he pulled off his seatbelt and got off of the car. Closing it, he walked around the back and stood in her path. It took her a few moments before she would come across him, and he had noticed that she was looking down at her feet.

Orihime stopped walking when she saw the shoes of a stranger in her eyesight. Looking up, she scowled once she saw the familiar blue sparkly sweater and same emerald eyes.

"You said you were going to take a taxi, so why are you walking?" She looked away and he continued. "If you were hoping I'd come out looking for you, asking to give you a ride, if that's why you sent away your director or whatever..." Orihime scoffed and stepped to the right, trying to get out of the way. However, he saw her plan and mimicked her actions. "Where did you learn your manners? I'm not done speaking yet. Why aren't you taking a taxi?"

"What's it to you whether I take a taxi or not? Are you a taxi company employee?"

"Why do you keep making up my life? First I'm Pantera's errand man form some hick town, and now you have me working at a taxi company?"

"Then, what are you?"

Not wanting to reveal his identity, he asked, "I asked you why aren't you taking a taxi? I've never asked a woman this, but, is it because you don't have money? If that's the case, I can drive you. Where do you live?"

"What a wack job. Really, I'm only holding back because of the 3 Disasters." She tried stepping to the right again, and he met her movements.

"If I put the top up, will you get in?" He offered, "Okay, I'll put it up."

"Why should I ride in your car?"

"Because I want to give you a ride."

"What?" She blinked.

"I want to give you a ride," he offered.

"Why?" _What is up with this guy?_ She thought.

"What do you mean why? When people say, I want to fly to the skies, I want to be happy, do they need a reason? It's the same thing. I just want to give you a ride. Why won't you let me when I want to?" _But the real question is: Why am I begging this woman to let me give her a ride?_ He thought as she scoffed softly. "I told you I'd put the top up." In the distance, both of them heard tires screeching loudly, the sound coming closer to them. Turning to see what the commotion was, both saw a black van with tinted windows pull up behind Ulquiorra's sports car. The passenger side opened, and out jumped Grimmjow. The blue-haired male was wearing a white blazer, skinny jeans, and a cheetah print scarf. On top of his head were a pair of sunglasses.

"Hey! You wanna die?" He yelled as Orihime's expression changed to one of shock, her mouth opened a bit. "Why don't you answer your phone?!"

"I told you I'd talk to you when I got home," Ulquiorra complained.

"How upset do you think I am to come chasing after you here? I called Udahara and he said some strange woman..." he turned and pointed to Orihime, but stopped speaking once he saw her glistening gray eyes, which were full of admiration. He then looked away, and tidied himself up, fixing his scarf and his hair. In a much calmer voice, he said, "Aigoo*, what's Udahara's problem? Calling anyone strange like that." Ulquiorra frowned at Grimjow's chane in attitude. Grimmjow turned back to Orihime and bowed, "nice to meet you," looking up he continued, "perhaps you know who I-"

"Hey!" Ulquiorra interrupted him, "go do your self-promoting on Inkigayo*."

Grimmjow faked a laugh, and still turned to Orihime, he said, "his personality is the dumps isn't it?" He laughed joyfully again, still looking her in the eyes.

Orihime stayed still, _would he remember me? Probably not_ she thought. Her gray, almond shaped eyes looked at him in awe.

Grimmjow then stopped, and pointed to her, "Oi... That look in your eyes, I remember it."

Ulquiorra shook his head and scoffed, "there he goes again," he mumbled to himself. _Why does he have to flirt with every woman he sees?_

"And I remember the little beads of sweat on your forehead too. You looked up at me so nervous."

"I did?" Orihime asked, still in awe.

"You don't remember? You were really nervous that day. But it was a pretty bold first meeting, though, don't you think?"

"So, it's like that between the two of you?" Ulquiorra asked, curious to what his cousin spoke of.

Orihime peered up at him, "Are you crazy?" Looking back at Grimmjow, she softly spoke, "um.. I think you might be mistaking me for someone else."

Grimmjow smiled, "Ayyy, but I'm not." Looking to the sky, he thought back into his memories, he finally knew, "Ah right, right. That movie. _Welcome to Dongjakgu._ The one where a level 10 civil servant becomes the mayor. You were Riku Suzambo's double then, right?"

Orihime breathed, _H_ _e does remember me!_ Her inner fangirl squealed.

"Ah, you still look great," looking back down at her, he winked, "Miss Orihime Inoue." He smiled, showing off his teeth. Orihime was ecstatic, yet she did not show it, but she was slightly trembling with excitement. Her gray eyes were widened, and her mouth formed into a soft smile.

Ulquiorra frowned, jealous of the effect his cousin had on Orihime. _Why is she smiling like that?!_

 **~End Chapter One~**

 **I hope you guys liked it!**

 **Be sure to favourite it and leave a review!**

 **:)**

 **oh, and here are all the meanings of the subscripts:**

1: Doenjang girl- a satirical expression used in South Korea to describe a woman that scrimps on essentials so they can over-spend unnecessary luxuries. In other words, a woman that buys cheap yet necessary items in order to use the remainder of the money to buy useless items that are very expensive.

2: Aigoo- A word used to show frustration. The Korean equivalent of "aw man!" or "geez." It can be used in _some of_ the same context as aish.

3: Aish- A Korean interjection that can be used to express frustration or anger. It may be considered a curse word by some. It can be used in _some of_ the same context as aigoo.

4: 3 Disasters- War, Pestilence, and Famine. They are used when in a state of danger or threats used against a republic or large group. But when I used it in the story, Orihime's friend clearly meant to use it as in a modernized type of way.

Based on these subscripts, you can expect much more of them in the future :)


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